Tag Archives: crowd out

On paper, Medicaid coverage appears far better than what most Americans enjoy — with lower cost-sharing and unlimited benefits. But by almost all measures, Medicaid enrollees fare worse than similar patients with private insurance and often experience worse health issues than patients with no insurance. Wisconsin made a wise choice when it decided to forgo a full Medicaid expansion in favor of a smaller program that would maximize the availability of private coverage for Wisconsin’s low-income residents

Indeed, rather than bringing people together, public schooling often forces people of disparate backgrounds and beliefs into political combat. This paper tracks almost 150 such incidents in the 2005–06 school year alone. Whether over the teaching of evolution, the content of library books, religious expression in the schools, or several other common points of contention, conflict was constant in American public education last year.

The 2,700-page Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act created the architecture for the government-controlled health care system that the administration is busily constructing through thousands of pages of regulation. Yet some argue that ObamaCare isn’t a government takeover of health care. Here are ten reasons why it is:

MANDATES For the first time ever, the federal government will force citizens to use their own money to purchase a private product. The fact that the Supreme Court says the penalty for not complying is a tax does not diminish this breathtaking assertion of federal authority. Americans now are compelled to purchase an expensive health insurance product every month for their entire lives. What’s the next purchase the government will compel?

GOVERNMENT DECIDES The federal government will also determine what health care benefits are “essential” — not us, not our doctors, but government bureaucrats.

REGULATIONS Doctors and hospitals will face an avalanche of new reporting rules to make sure they are providing medical services that fit the government’s definition of “quality care.”

159 NEW BUREAUCRACIES The legislation creates at least 159 new boards, commissions, and programs that will rule over virtually every corner of the health care sector.

STATES The states are being treated like contractors to the federal government, not sovereign entities empowered by the Constitution. They are ordered to set up new exchange bureaucracies lest the federal government sweep in and do it for them.

EMPLOYER MANDATE Any employer with more than 50 employees must provide government-decreed health insurance to its workers — or face financial penalties.

LOSING CURRENT COVERAGE Nearly 80 million people will not have the option of keeping the coverage they get through their jobs, according to results of a survey from McKinsey & Company. Many of them will be forced into the government-run health insurance exchanges.

HIGHER SPENDING ObamaCare dramatically expands the number of people whose health coverage will be paid for entirely or in part by taxpayers, giving the government more power to decide which medical services millions more people will receive — or not.

PRIVACY In order to parcel out taxpayer subsidies for insurance, the government and employers are going to need to know a lot more about us. An estimated 16,500 more IRS agents will be needed to check on our income and any changes to family status and our compliance with this massive new law.

PUBLIC PLANS The law creates the infrastructure for public plans by requiring a federal agency to sponsor at least two national health plans. If private plans are crushed by ObamaCare’s regulations or simply turned into government contractors, these government plans could dominate the market, leading to the government-run health care system that the majority of Americans deplore.

We hope you find this Pro Patient Minute useful. Please feel free to circulate this to friends, family, and associates who need to know the truth about ObamaCare. The whole series is available on our website as Galen Guides. I encourage you to use these resources, distribute them to your networks, and share your ideas with us about how to reach as many people as possible with this message. Our freedom hangs in the balance!

Don’t governors have every incentive to fleece the taxpayers of other states? It turns out, however, that this logic is flawed, and that the Medicaid expansion will cause state budgets to explode. Here’s why. …

For the first three years of the expansion, federal taxpayers will pick up the full cost of the expansion. This 100 percent funding rate will phase down to 95 percent in 2017, 94 percent in 2018, 93 percent in 2019, and 90 percent in 2020.

Many states are rightly worried that, given federal budget pressures, Washington won’t continue to cover 90 percent of the costs after 2020. But because the new Medicaid enrollees will now be dependent on the government, states won’t be politically or legally able to roll back their programs, leaving state taxpayers with the bill. The Wall Street Journalaptly compares this to “a subprime loan with a teaser rate and balloon payment.” …

[The] “woodwork” population, that was already eligible for Medicaid but not enrolled, won’t get the Obamacare 90-100 percent funding rate. Their expenses will be covered under the traditional FMAP percentage, meaning that states will be on the hook for 43 percent of the costs. …

These woodworkers will find it much easier to sign up for Medicaid under the program’s new rules.

Health plans across the country are leaving the small group and individual health insurance markets, forcing people to find other sources of coverage. In this paper, we provide examples of how millions of people in dozens of states already are being negatively impacted by the law — from New York to Colorado, Virginia to Florida, and Connecticut to Indiana.

The paper provides an overview of carriers leaving the market; the impact of Obama administration rules on the child-only health insurance market; the disruptions caused by rules governing health premium payouts and “grandfathering;” and the threats to the Medicare Advantage market. …

Some insurance carriers are leaving the market because of onerous state regulations, others are victims of a faltering economy, but the cascade has been accelerated by the rules that already have taken effect and the many more that are to come as a result of ObamaCare [HR 3590].

Blitzer talks about “society” letting someone die, but whom does he mean? Each individual is part of society, so isn’t the real question, “What are YOU going to do about it?” Treating “society” as some super-entity above and beyond the individuals who compose it causes two problems. First, it gives individuals an excuse to do nothing by their own initiative; second, it encourages many to ignore the actual victims of politicians’ forced wealth transfer schemes.

The Boulder Daily Camera published my article criticizing Governor’s veto of Senate Bill 11-213. Here are the first and last paragraphs:

“Let them drink beer, while you pay.” This is how Colorado taxpayers should interpret Governor Hickenlooper’s recent veto of Senate Bill 213. For some families, SB 213 would have increased the Child Health Plan Plus (CHP+) enrollment fee to $20 per month. This is what the lowest income U.S. households spend on alcohol.

…

CHP+ officials will soon propose changes to CHP+ fees and possibly co-payments, which are also extremely low. Maintaining current fees would not only be an injustice to taxpayers, but also an insult to eligible parents. The fees imply that parents value enjoying life’s amenities more than their own children’s health.